Is the wait almost over on Virgin’s Qatar deal?

It’s been a few months since the announcement of one of the biggest deals in recent Australian commercial aviation history: the purchase of 25 per cent of Virgin Australia by Qatar Airways, and with it, the return of Virgin international wide-body services through a wet-lease agreement for flights to Doha.

Approval for those services currently rests with the International Air Services Commission, a government body that will decide whether to award Virgin the necessary 28 flights per week to Qatar – and Virgin has said in a letter to the IASC that there is essentially no reason to block the proposal, which has received widespread support and is not being contested.

Adam and Jake revisit the politics at play and ask when the airlines – and punters – could see the new flights greenlit.

Plus, is the federal government on a path to nationalising Rex, and could we see the return of commercial supersonic travel sooner than we expected?